Analysis, Europe, Side Feature

Russia: The Fake Fight against Terrorism

On 12 April 2019, in Tyumen, Russia, the counter-terrorist operation (CTO) regime was introduced. The FSB regional department reported that an ISIS group had barricaded itself in one of the private houses. The operation was carried out on the territory of 4 streets. The local media reported that electricity and street lighting were cut off in the area, and residents of the private sector were evacuated. The Internet and mobile communications were also disconnected. The 72.ru edition wrote that the special services vehicles traveled around Tyumen for hours, and on one of the streets, the Tyumen people counted 24 crews at once.

As a result of the operation, two people from Ingushetia who lived in the house were killed, and the special services immediately declared them to be members of ISIS. Many Russian independent journalists and human rights activists expressed serious doubts about the affiliation of those killed to ISIS, accusing the FSB of a staged operation.

 

Comment:

It is noteworthy that the CTO in Tyumen was held the day after 11 April, when Putin at a meeting with senior security officers, said that the FSB should “concentrate on preventing terrorist attacks, identifying hidden, deeply secret cells of extremists.”

In fact, there was no fight against terrorism. There was a large-scale show to intimidate the population, to impart significance to the FSB, to create an imitation of anti-terrorism activity: dozens of cars with flashing lights; whole neighborhoods, cordoned off by the troops; armored personnel carriers on the streets; hundreds of special forces soldiers in helmets and body armors, scurrying back and forth; residents evacuated until the morning, who were in the area of the CTO; disconnected power supply and muted cellular communication; shooting, explosions, fire, etc.

And all this, allegedly, because of the two members of the ISIS, whose bodies were found in the house destroyed by security forces. What the public was shown by the official media is actually called a military operation. And military operations are being carried out against the large armed groups, and not to “arrest suspects,” as stated at first. If they really wanted to detain two suspects, they would have done it without unnecessary noise, by the efforts of several police officers, without even attracting SWAT (OMON). But there was no goal to arrest the suspects, especially to keep them alive: residents evacuated, no witnesses, mobile communications and the Internet are disconnected, journalists are not allowed because of CTO regime, and the bodies of those killed in the CTO are not given to relatives according to the law, so we will not know, from where these bodies, when and where they were killed, perhaps somewhere in the basement of the FSB under the tortures. And in general, the label “terrorist” is very convenient: anyone killed by security forces, even under tortures, can be declared a terrorist, and this is no longer a murder, but a “special operation” and “liquidation”, and the murderers are already “the fighters against terrorism”.

 

Shaikhetdin Abdullah